Johann Sebastian Bach [1685–1750] was the driving force behind the maturity of the Baroque movement in classical music. In addition to his skills as a composer, Bach was also a noted organist and keyboard player, a choir director, and a violinist. He was born in Eisenach, Germany, to a family of professional musicians. His father led a group of local players, and assorted uncles on his father’s side held various posts such as church organist or court orchestral musician. Bach became orphaned at the age of 10, but not before learning to play the violin and the harpsichord from his father. Four years later he received a scholarship to attend a prestigious music school near Hamburg. After graduation, he was hired as a court musician for a minor royal in Weimar. This led him to a string of musician and organist posts throughout Northern Germany. A move to Leipzig in 1723 was his final relocation—he remained a resident of that city until his death. It was here that he composed the vast majority of his major pieces while officially serving as the music director of St. Thomas’s Lutheran Church.
Bach’s musical style combines elements of counterpoint and fluidity, and his material is highly melodic. His influences involved exposure to the early Baroque masters from the German, French and Italian schools—Pachelbel, Lully, Marchand, and Frescobaldi predominate—along with liturgical music from the Lutheran Church. He composed in a wide variety of formats and was incredibly prolific. His organ works include a setting of 21 chorale preludes plus the “Little Organ Book.” His best-known harpsichord works include The Well Tempered Clavier and the Goldberg Variations. His top orchestral works—primarily for strings—include the Brandenburg concertos and The Art of the Fugue. He composed a number of vocal works including cantatas and some massive choral pieces, among them the St. Matthew Passion, the Christmas Oratorio, and Mass in B-minor.
Bach sired seven children with his first wife, four of whom survived to adulthood, and an additional 13 children with his second wife; six of them survived to adulthood. Four of his children became well-known composers in their own right: Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Wilhelm Friedrich Bach, Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach, and Johann Christian Bach. His last known descendent—a great-granddaughter—died in 1871.
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